How I got a reptile-keeping licence for dead serial killer Ivan Milat
The NSW premier has closed a licence loophole that was allowing crime gangs to use fake names to smuggle snakes and lizards worth millions on the black market after the Daily Telegraph exposed the flawed process.
NSW
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Asian crime gangs are acquiring NSW reptile licenses in fake names to buy snakes and lizards that are then smuggled out of the country, netting them millions of dollars on the black market, it can be revealed.
In order to show how easily the licences can be obtained, The Daily Telegraph recently went online and secured a two-year reptile keeper’s licence using the name of serial killer Ivan Milat and the address of Bondi Icebergs.
It cost only $113 paid to the NSW Department of Climate Change, Energy and Environment and Water. The licence came back in just minutes of the application being made.
“Mr Ivan Milat … Congratulations! Your application for a Native Animal Keepers licence for the following classes has been approved,’’ the reply email read.
The next day, after being informed of how easily the Telegraph was able to obtain a licence without having to provide any proof of identification, the department cancelled the licence.
An email headed “Notice of Cancellation” was sent to the Telegraph that read: “Ivan Milat, 1 Notts Avenue Bondi Beach, NSW.
“It has come to my attention that the application did allegedly contain information that was false or misleading in a material particular, including the name and address of the applicant,’’ the email read
The department said doing so is an offence that carries a penalty of $330,000 for an individual and $1,650,000 for a corporation.
It was signed off by a National Parks and Wildlife executive, but it failed to acknowledge the only reason the department knew the information was false was because the Telegraph had told them.
NSW Premier Chris Minns on Tuesday said the state’s reptile licensing system will be reverted to a manual process following The Daily Telegraph’s expose.
Mr Minns said the change would ensure criminals - including dead ones - would no longer be able to rort the system.
“I was very, very concerned about reports of a notorious criminal receiving a reptile licence,” he said.
“Ministers looked at it this morning - obviously (licences) were being automatically generated. There’s no point having a licensing system if it’s going to be automatic, so they’re going to take steps to revert it back to a manual process so there [can] be some integrity in the system.
“I thank The Daily Telegraph for bringing it to ours and the public’s attention, but obviously, changes need to be made.”
When asked if this masthead would be fined for uncovering the issue, Mr Minns said: “I sincerely doubt it.”
A series of questions about how many fake licences have been detected or the number of people prosecuted have not been answered by the department.
“This has been going on for years all over the country, but NSW is the slackest and the hub of most of the illegal reptile trade in Australia,’’ said a former NSW Parks and Wildlife officer.
“Asian crime gangs have stepped into this space and are making massive amounts of money.”
For example, people on student or tourist visas from Asia acquire a license online and then will post the reptiles to Hong Kong, with the common blue tongue lizard fetching more than $1500 or up to $5000.
Shinglebacks, which retail for around $500 to $600, can fetch well over $10,000 in the US.
Australia’s leading expert on wildlife crime, Adelaide University professor Phil Cassey, has testified in several court cases against reptile smugglers.
He said reptiles being smuggled out of Australia was a growing problem.
“We are seeing an increase in illegal smuggling of reptiles from Australia to Hong Kong, which is really only a transit point for places such as Europe and America,’’ said Professor Cassey.
“A reptile bought here can regularly get ten times its value on the black market overseas – and often more.”
Other experts have told the Telegraph off the record that some reptiles, particularly those with exotic colourings, can get close to 30 times their retail value on the black market.
“There are some people operating small syndicates, but there is also an organised crime element as well, illegal wildlife smuggling ranks only behind drugs, weapons and human trafficking, which is an indication how profitable it can be,’’ Professor Cassey said.
NSW Police’s Raptor Unit boss, Detective Superintendent Andrew Koutsoufis, said his squad are often called into work with National Parks and Wildlife.
“It is not uncommon for the criminal element that we target to be involved in the illegal trafficking of exotic animals,’’ he said.
“Criminals are drawn to big snakes and reptiles because they represent two things they value most: power and money.
“The animals themselves are a show of power, while the illegal trade is lucrative.”
Craig Williams, Australian Herpetological Society president of the Australian Herpetological Society, said the whole licensing system needs to be scrapped.
“All it does is make money for National Parks and Wildlife and serves no purpose, you don’t need a licence for a budgie and many of those being traded will have just been picked up in the wild anyway,’’ he said.
From June 2023 to January this year, arrests across the country for smuggling have tripled and parcel detections have increased by more than 500 per cent.
Man Lung Ma, 37, was arrested in a Hurstville hotel last year and charged with trying to mail $360,000 of lizards to Hong Kong from 24 different post offices all over Australia.
He had 99 reptiles including blue tongue lizards, shinglebacks, geckos, monitors and skinks.
They were stuffed in socks and then put in plastic containers mixed in with toys, clothes and food packages.
Ma was recruited while he was driving an Uber in Hong Kong and paid $300 per reptile and he used a wildlife permit in another person’s name to buy lizards in NSW.
All up, the 99 animals would have netted $364,417, with three shinglebacks worth $20,000 alone.
He was sentenced to three and half years jail.
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Originally published as How I got a reptile-keeping licence for dead serial killer Ivan Milat
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